User profiles are frank, all over the map

For an adult, reading teen profiles on MySpace.com is both startling and poignant. They seem, in every sense, so young: brash but enthusiastic, full of themselves yet vulnerable. They're provocative one moment — posting a picture in a bikini and describing their occupation as "hooker" — then back to being a kid with pigtails in another shot.

"I am gullible, but don't take advantage of it," warns one young local teen in her self-description. She later admits, "I have low self-asteem.[sic]"

Many teens post answers to long questionnaires, from "Pepsi or Coke?" to "Have you ever been drunk?" to "Do you get along with your parents?"

It's an uncensored peek into a seemingly unfathomable world.

Some students blog (a sort of online diary), but many just post comments to each other in an informal forum on their profile page. It's like an online record of instant-message dialogue, with most falling in the "what r u doing?" category.

Sample entry from a local teen, all sic: "we better be hangin out tomorrow like we said we would! haha ... if you read this tonight, call me ... . i'll be up for a while. LOL i should just call you but im too lazy. but YAAAAh talk to you later! haha much love."

Getting beyond the oft-times offensive language (the f-word is popular, as is "whore," etc.), some exchanges are serious.

One local eighth-grader wrote (sic): "you know that thing in my drawer that's made of glass that we used insence to cover the smell of? well my mommy found out that I had once upon a time put it to use ... she said something about how she didn't want me to take drugs and become a retard and how she wants me to go to college or something? so yeah. no more for [me] for a while. )="

A 14-year-old student shared, verbatim, "I know that no matter what I have myself so its good that i am my own person, and i think that will take me farther than any of the people I know, either that or I will end up killing myself in a couple of years."

— Stephanie Dunnewind, Seattle Times staff reporter